The DoorsThe Doors

There’s so much to be said of The Doors but the only words truly worth listening to are those that the band recorded to wax and there cannot be any better starting point than their eponymous debut album. An electrifying LP with heavy hitters such as Break on Through (To The Other Side) and Soul Kitchen, the LP finishes with eleven brooding minutes of bubbling insanity, and surely the band’s most recognisable track - The End.

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I have a love/hate relationship with The Doors. They are a band I’ve liked since I was about 8, ever since I found a “Best Of” LP among my uncle’s record collection. I was taken in by Jim Morrison’s stare (he was looking right at me!) on the cover and then “Break On Through” which opened the album. It also opens their eponymous debut and its one hell of an opening track. I’ve always loved “Light My Fire” too, the song, that when edited from its full 7 minute glory became the 3 minute single that got them noticed. My love/hate relationship leaned more towards hate when I got a bit older and found Jim Morrison to be a bit of pretentious so-and-so. This was around the time of the Oliver Stone biopic, which I was initially fascinated by – perhaps I just got bored with The Doors overkill. I stopped listening to them. Some years later I found myself listening to them again and thoroughly enjoying them.

The Doors brought a new organ-led jazz-rock sound, but were also steeped in the trippy psychedelia of the time. This album was is full of it: the idea of breaking through to the other side, the band’s name, taken from the title of an Aldous Huxley book which was inspired by a William Blake quote about the Doors of perception being open, “The Crystal Ship” begins “Before you slip into unconsciousness…” with music and melody that evokes a dream-like state at the very least and the album ends with the 11-minute epic “The End” in which Morrison positions himself as an Oedipus-style character amidst drug-fuelled, stream-of-consciousness lyrics. All-in-all, it’s a pretty compelling debut.